For Sauce

Instructions

Slice the flank steak into small thin pieces against the grain. In a large plastic bag, add the starch and the beef to it. Close the bag, and shake until each piece is coated well.

In a non stick skillet heat the ghee. When the ghee is hot, add beef and cook until browned. Remove beef from skillet to a plate.

In that same skillet add sauce ingredients, the sesame oil, coconut aminos, coconut sugar, garlic, and chicken broth. Stir and cook over medium heat until sauce thickens a bit and reduces by about a quarter. It takes about 10 minutes until the sauce thickens.

Cook the brown rice noodles according to package instructions.

Steam the broccoli.

Add the beef and broccoli to the skillet and toss in the sauce. Add the cooked brown rice noodles to the skillet and toss everything together. Serve.

For more ideas for healthy, easy family meals, subscribe for my FREE two week meal plan!
For ideas of how to feed your child nutrient dense food, check out my E-Book, A Recipe for a Healthy Baby.

Butter makes everything better!

Especially for a baby’s first tastes, butter helps them find vegetables much more acceptable. My son loved cauliflower pureed with butter, and now, plain cauliflower is one of his favorite finger foods. Vegetables are rich in vitamins and minerals, and butter provides healthy saturated fats for their growing brains along with vitamin D. The collagen in this recipe is key. Collagen is the most abundant protein in our bodies, helping to grow our bone, skin, teeth, hair and nails. Children need high quantities of collagen to ensure proper growth. Plus, it is the easiest form of protein to digest. A study also showed that glycine in the evening can improve sleep quality. So, this meal would be a great dinner because a good night’s sleep for baby is a good night’s sleep for the parents too!

Egg-cellent First Foods

One common guideline when starting solid foods is to start with one for a few days and then introduce another food a few days later. With this strategy, in the case of an allergic reaction, parents can pinpoint the source directly. I deviated from this recommendation to provide nutrient density at the same time as acceptability of the food. I really wanted to start with egg yolks as a first food because of the healthy fats, cholesterol, and choline that it provided. However, in my research, The Weston A. Price Foundation noted that some children struggle with the egg yolk by itself. Plus, the yolk is very runny and harder to keep on a spoon than other solids. So, I decided to combine it with a widely accepted first food, avocado, that contains healthy monounsaturated fats, along with vitamins like Vitamin E, minerals like magnesium and potassium, and fiber. I felt that even by introducing two foods at first instead of one, it would be easy to determine which one caused a reaction in the case that it happened.

Starting Stage III Baby Foods

Once you start the third stage of baby foods, the food will change to even chunkier baby food purees. To start this stage, you may want your baby to have a few teeth, and they may have started crawling as well.

For this stage, you can make many of the homemade baby food recipes you have been without blending them as much. You may also want to start to put a few pieces of veggies on your baby’s highchair tray to allow them to practice their pincer grasp and self feeding.

Tip: Choose the foods that they practice picking-up as the least expensive foods on the plate. I didn’t want my son dumping pricier pieces of grass-fed, organic meat or wild-caught fish onto the floor or into his lap if I could help it!

Autumn Vegetable and Chicken Dinner Recipe

When creating my baby food recipes, I looked at what the market was selling, and therefore, what modern babies were eating. So, I created a few homemade copycat versions of popular stage III baby foods from a certain big name baby food company. This version of the Stage III baby food puree is easy to make at home and allows you to choose the quality of your ingredients. Plus, it will have retained more of the nutrients since it didn’t go through any high heat processing.

Your child will get great protein from the chicken, and magnesium from the cauliflower. The sweet potatoes and carrots are rich in the precursor to vitamin A. Parsnips are a slightly sweet root vegetable that are somewhere between a carrot and a potato in taste and are rich in vitamin C. Finally, the butter contains healthy fats that aid in the absorption of vitamin A and contains vitamin D.

Ingredients:

1 lb pasture-raised chicken thighs

1 cup carrots

1 cup parsnips

1 cup cauliflower

1 cup sweet potato

1/4 cup onion

1/4 tsp parsley

1/2 tsp sea salt

1/4 tsp rosemary

1/4 tsp thyme

2 TBSP grass-fed butter or ghee (for cooking)

Note: Try to get all natural, organic ingredients if you can.

Directions:

1. Dice up the carrots, parsnips, cauliflower, and sweet potato. Try to make each piece about a 1/2 inch.

2. Melt 2 TBSP of butter in a pan on medium heat. Dice the onion, and add to the pan.

3. Cube the chicken (1/2 inch – 1 inch pieces), and cook chicken with the onion in a pan on medium heat. Add the parsley, salt, rosemary, and thyme. Pull off the heat once the meat is cooked through and the onions are golden.

4. While the meat is cooking, steam the carrots, parsnips, cauliflower, and sweet potato for 10 minutes. Remove from the steamer once softened.

4. Once everything is cooked, add the meat, veggies, and fat to the blender. Chop in the food processor until the mixture is a chunky puree.

For more ideas for healthy, easy family meals, subscribe for my FREE two week meal plan!
For ideas of how to feed your child nutrient dense food, check out my E-Book, A Recipe for a Healthy Baby.

A Baby Pumpkin Dish for Every Season

It’s pumpkin season, and my husband is a huge pumpkin fan! So, I had to see if Noah loved pumpkin as much as him, and he definitely loves it. Pumpkin is a healthy carbohydrate that contains high amounts of the precursor form of vitamin A. This custard also contains coconut milk and butter that provide healthy fats that aid in the absorption of the vitamin A. The eggs yolks also contain healthy fats, vitamin A, vitamin D, cholesterol, and choline.

Ingredients

1 cup full-fat coconut milk

1 cup pumpkin

6 egg yolks

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

4 TBSP grass-fed butter (plus butter for ramekins)

1 tsp cinnamon

Directions

1. Crack the eggs, and separate the yolks from the whites. You can save the whites in the refrigerator for another dish.

2. Melt the butter. I microwave it for 30 seconds.

3. Mix all ingredients together in a blender. Blend until the batter is smooth.

Starting Stage II Baby Foods

You should start the second stage of baby foods once your baby has gotten adjusted to solid foods. There is no perfect time because it is really just about feeling when your baby is ready for more diverse and complex foods in terms of flavor and texture. They may enjoy chunkier purees as teeth come in. Some note this stage as when your baby can sit on their own, but there may be some other signs as well. With my son, I noticed he would get bored with certain foods that I had given him from the start, and he started fussing or grabbing for the spoon. Giving him new combinations helped renew his interest, and putting some food in a mesh teething bag for him to hold sometimes, helped him feel in control. Personally, I did not choose to do much baby led weaning because my priority was to increase his calorie and nutrient intake. So, for you, it may make sense to incorporate baby led weaning much sooner.

Chicken and Plantain Puree Recipe

This chicken and plantain recipe resembles a simple comfort meal but a healthy baby one. I was inspired by meals such as fried chicken with mashed potatoes or chicken and waffles. Plantains have a slight sweetness and offer a great source of healthy carbohydrates. This makes it a great lunch or dinner meal. Plantains contain vitamin C, potassium, vitamin B6, and the precursor form of Vitamin A. Chicken provides a great source of protein, and the butter aids in the utilization of the vitamin A and contains vitamin D. It is important to vary your child’s sources of starches, proteins, and fats to ensure they are getting all the nutrients they need.

Ingredients

1 lb chicken boneless thighs

2 plantains

2 TBSP fat (butter, coconut oil, lard)

coconut milk for blending

Directions

Bake chicken at 350°F for 30 minutes.

Cool chicken once baked, and cut into large chunks. Aim for 1/2 inch to inch chunks depending on the efficiency of your blender.

Peel and slice the plantain. Cut them into 1/2 inch pieces. Over 2 cups of boiling water, steam the plantains for 8 minutes. Remove from the steamer once they are softened.

Place the chicken, plantains, and fat into blender.

Pulse the mixture until it is blended but still chunky. If needed, add coconut milk in 1/4 cup increments so the mixture blends easier.

Starting Stage II Baby Foods

As your baby grows, this is a great time to experiment with sneaking in new and different flavors as well as ingredients (like other veggies)! You should start the second stage of baby foods once your baby has gotten adjusted to solid foods. There is no perfect time because it is really just about feeling when your baby is ready for more diverse and complex foods in terms of flavor and texture. They may enjoy chunkier purees as teeth come in. Some note this stage as when your baby can sit on their own, but there may be some other signs as well. With my son, I noticed he would get bored with certain foods that I had given him from the start, and he started fussing or grabbing for the spoon. Giving him new combinations helped renew his interest, and putting some food in a mesh teething bag for him to hold sometimes, helped him feel in control. Personally, I did not choose to do much baby led weaning because my priority was to increase his calorie and nutrient intake. So, for you, it may make sense to incorporate baby led weaning much sooner.

Turkey Marinara Puree Recipe

With this recipe, babies can enjoy Italian night too!! This turkey marinara is packed with healthy fats, fiber, protein, and vitamins and minerals. Spinach adds folate, while the cauliflower gives a boost of magnesium. Plus, the tomato from the marinara offers potassium and Vitamin C.